Wednesday, March 22, 2017

Gloucester's Over Inflated Budgets?

If you listen to the present board of Supervisors and the present county administration, these folks are doing everything they can to keep taxes down. Are they?

Let's look at the facts. On the one hand, I would say they are trying to keep present costs within control. But they are not really doing anything to cut taxes by cutting out ridiculous government programs they like to tell us are services. Zoning, not a service. Planning, not a service, building and codes, not a service. These departments should be cut and the money returned to the people.

There is also too much fluff in many departments that one has to question if that many people are really needed to run them? Present budget being presented to the board is maintaining present level so called government services that we simply do not need nor want. The school board is the biggest factor in tremendous waste. Way too many administration personnel that I would love to see fully justified and not with lip service that means little to nothing but sounds good.

We have problems with department heads that earn in the neighborhood of one hundred thousand a year that could not and I will repeat, can NOT transfer those same skills to the private sector and earn even close to those wages. Something is horribly wrong here. I am not knocking the people in those jobs, most do a great job. But when the same skills pay much lower in the private sector, then we have a major disparity going on in our government.

We have people in government who are empire building and all at the expense of the taxpayer. If you want to build an empire, great, I am all for it, in the private sector. Not at the cost of the taxpayer. The school board comes to mind here as these folks have been wasting taxpayer dollars to the tune of millions that we have shown over and over on this site. Did I say education? I meant indoctrination. Schools no longer educate. They indoctrinate the children who will never question. They might ask questions when they do not understand the directive, but they are taught to not question the directive. Indoctrination costs more than education. We see this reflected in our taxes as they continue to skyrocket each year.

I get tired of the lip service paid each month at the county meetings and it turns out to be nothing more than lip service with no real actions. Charging people a fee to get a business license? That means you do not have the right to start a business without government permission. Not exactly what the framers of our Constitution had in mind. That also means you are paying a tribute to the government for the privilege of allowing you to put your savings at risk. That's pretty sad.

Freedom is gone as long as you are forced to pay for starting a business, maintaining your business every year, what you can do with your land, how and what size signs the government is going to allow you to put up, and then you have to collect taxes for the government at your expense? Really? Really! We are being fooled and robbed at every turn and there is no end in sight.

Yet everyone thinks this is all normal. No one studies history to see this is all only about 70 years old and grew very slowly. Our government officials thinks these concepts are normal and have not looked into history to see that it is not. Nor will they. In fairness, our board is comprised of some great folks that are decent people and a good time to talk to. As individuals, I have the utmost respect for them. As a collective, they are thieves as long as they continue to perpetrate these frauds against the taxpayers and business owners. They each need to go back through history and return to the principles of our founding fathers.

Tear down the services that are not services but instead government theft with no value. You do not attract business by demanding tributes be paid to the government before the government even thinks about what they will allow and what they will restrict you with. I don't care every locality does it. I don't care the state and federal government allows it. That does not make it right. In fact, the federal courts have said it is illegal when it comes to planning and zoning when planning and zoning goes outside the purview of government owned lands and properties. The same has also been said about business licensing. But who listens to the courts?

Some will argue that some of the services like zoning are good and protect the rights of private property. I disagree and there are plenty of market conditions that can easily be put in place that do not require government interference. These so called services are nothing more than socialist programs. Socialist programs are not du jur where one gets to pick and choose what programs they like and what programs they do not like. Under socialism, you get it all like it or not.